November 12 ~ The Science of Mind in a Year

THE PRACTICE of SPIRITUAL MIND HEALING
Ernest Holmes

"Let us again briefly go over what it is that one must do.  He must first of all BELIEVE.  The supposition is that the reader already believes or he would not be studying thus far.  Why must we believe?  Because God is belief.  God is belief and belief is Law, and the Law produces form, in substance.  When Jesus explained to his disciples that they had failed to heal because of lack of faith, they protested that they did have faith in God.  Jesus explained to them that this was insufficient; they must have the faith of God.  The faith of God is very different from a faith in God.  The faith of God IS God, and somewhere along the line of our spiritual evolution this transition will gradually take place, where we shall cease having a faith IN and shall have the faith OF.  Always in such degree as this happens, a demonstration takes place.  We must believe because God is belief; the  physical Universe is built out of belief - faith, belief, acceptance, conviction.

This is only the starting point.  What good is the possibility until it is used?  What good is knowledge unless we make practical application of it?  Therefore we must definitely speak our conviction in concrete form in Mind.  A treatment should always be definite, specific, concrete.  In practical treatment one does not become subjective.  The creative act is always conscious.  In other words, a treatment moves in thought, sets something in motion, is an active thing.

For instance, suppose we have received a request for help for a physical condition.  Immediately we take the name of the person in consciousness - as every man maintains his identity in Universal Mind, just as he maintains it in the physical world - and we declare the truth about that man, the truth about the spiritual man, and we know that the truth about Spiritual Man is the truth about that man's condition right now.  First, recognition; second, unification.  We continue to do this until something comes into our consciousness which says "Yes."  We know the work has been accomplished.  This is the third step, realization.  This is what a treatment is.  Perhaps we would hold this consciousness a while, and we might repeat this treatment two or three times a day for a time.  If we have agreed to treat the man, we should be certain to do so.  At the same time, we should be careful, after the treatment has been given, that we take no responsibility of trying to make it work.  The Law will work from its own energy; how, we do not know."

November 9 ~ The Science of Mind in a Year

THE PRACTICE of SPIRITUAL MIND HEALING
Ernest Holmes

"We would like to help ourselves and each other through using the Law of Mind.  This we may do by treatment.  What is a treatment? It is something the mind becomes aware of.  Someone might ask, "Is it something the Spirit of God does to us?"  Yes, the Spirit of God is everything, but the mind must accept, and since the mind cannot accept what it rejects, then the mind must unqualifiedly accept.  This is where the trouble comes in.  We all have the spiritual power to raise the dead, but we do not believe we have.  Our mind does not unqualifiedly accept this.   Therefore, that which we are, through disbelief, projects the form of have-not rather than the form of HAVE, but even in taking the form of have-not, it demonstrates that it has what it BELIEVES.

We enter the Absolute in such degree as we withdraw from the relative.  The Bible tells us not to count our enemies.  It is not easy, is it, to turn from a disease and KNOW THAT THERE IS NO DISEASE, when we know very well that it is an experience of the moment.  This is not easy, but the one who can do this, can heal.  The All-Creative Wisdom does not think one thing is difficult and another easy.  With God all things are possible.  We must know this and this Power of God must be hooked up with our thought, with what we are doing.  Energy unconnected does nothing, it is only when it is used, properly directed, that it accomplishes things."

October 6 ~ The Science of Mind in a Year

WHAT The MYSTICS HAVE TAUGHT
Ernest Holmes

Evolution

"The Universe, both visible and invisible, is a Spiritual System.  Man is a part of this Spiritual Order, so indivisibly united with It that the entire Cosmos is (or may be) reflected in his mind!  Evolution is the awakening of the soul to a recognition of its unity with the Whole.  Material evolution is an effect, not a cause.  This reverses the popular belief, declaring that evolution is the result of intelligence, rather than intelligence being the result of evolution!

The aim of evolution is to produce a man, who at the point of his objective thought may completely manifest the whole idea of life, may bring Unity to the point of particularization, finding nothing in the Law to oppose It.  The man Jesus became the Christ through a complete realization of the Unity of Spirit and the Absoluteness of His word.  His physical and spiritual faculties, His objective and subjective mind, were completely poised and perfectly balanced.

It is evident if this realization took place in any other individual, his word would be manifested likewise.  Because behind the word is Universal Soul, Omnipotent Law.  The Spirit is Limitless, but can only be to us what we believe It to be.  Why must we believe It is?  Because, UNTIL WE BELIEVE THAT IT IS, WE ARE BELIEVING THAT IT IS NOT!  It is all a matter of belief, but belief is scientifically induced into a subjective state, through conscious endeavor."

July 25 ~ The Science of Mind in a Year

MEDITATIONS for Self-Help

By Ernest Holmes

No Hypnotism nor False Suggestion

There is no hypnotism nor false suggestion.

I represent the One Mind which cannot act against Itself nor can It act against me.

I am immune to all suggestion and cannot receive false thoughts, nor harbor them.

I am surrounded with a circle of Love and Protection.

Asleep or awake, I am free from false thoughts.

I see the nothingness of all belief in, or fear of, otherness; 

and I know that The One and Only Mind, alone, can act.

Only the Good can enter.

July 10 ~ The Science of Mind in a Year

FROM THE TEACHING OF JESUS
By Ernest Holmes

God Can Only Give Us What We Take

"God cannot give us anything unless we are in a mental condition to receive the gift.  The Law cannot do anything for us unless it does it through us.  Belief is absolutely necessary to right demonstration.

We are on the path of experience, just waking to the real fact of our true being; as we awake, we find we are surrounded by many false conditions, but there is something within which remembers the real state.  If one will sit in quiet contemplation of good, as an inner experience, he will experience the good which he contemplates.  He can do this only as he turns from that which is evil and dwells on the good alone.  The Universe will not be divided.

The Universe Holds Nothing Against Us

The Universe holds nothing against us.  No matter how many mistakes we have made, we are still perfect beings within, and the within may become the without, if we will carefully train ourselves to listen to the inner voice of truth which speaks to us in our moments of quietness and solitude.

There is nothing in the Universe that wishes evil to anyone.  Indeed, it is only as we experience good that God is expressed through us.  The more completely we realize good, happiness and success, the more perfectly do we express God and the more of God do we become, that is, the more does God become personified through us.

As the prodigal returns to his father's house, so must we return, not with a morbid mind, but consciously and definitely, with direct intent and a complete concentration of purpose.  The journey back should be fraught with happiness and joyful expectation for we shall be met with a smile from the Universe and shall be folded in the arms of love forever.

The Eternal Completion

Substance and supply exist eternally in the Father's House; health, happiness and success are native to the Heavenly Home, and God Himself shall be our Host.  More we could not ask, more could not be given than that which has been given from the foundations of the Universe.

Discord, misery, and unhappiness are the result of a misuse of our true nature, the result of ignorance.  Ignorance of the law excuses no one from its effects; but knowledge clothes us in the seamless robe, while wisdom puts the ring of completion on our finger and understanding feeds us with the fat of the land.

No one who has tried this has failed; it would be impossible to do so.  If any have thought they have failed, let them realize that somewhere they have fallen short of the divine calling.  The Truth cannot fail, for it is God, the Absolute and Unconditioned One, who is the Truth.

Let us no longer fight the old; let us no longer remember that we were once on the outer rim; let us forget the past and live in the eternal present of God's happy smile.  Today is good; tomorrow will be even better, and that vista of tomorrows that stretches down the bright eternities of an endless future will all be good, for the nature of Reality cannot change."

July 7 ~ The Science of Mind in a Year

MENTAL EQUIVALENTS
By Ernest Holmes

How to Demonstrate a Home

"All our beautiful dreams, all our wishing and praying, for material good, will reach no higher level in our experience than our belief in the power of God and in His willingness to help us.  God's willingness to help us is expressed in the existence of that Immutable Law which gives us exactly the type of objective experience for which we build a mental likeness.  If we have the mental equivalent of a commodious home, roomy, light, cheery, and an income in keeping with it; if we are able to build in mind the kind of home we wish, and there is nothing in our subjective thought which denies this, then we shall be able to decide and demonstrate for ourself the kind of home we desire."

June 23 ~ The Science of Mind in a Year

MENTAL EQUIVALENTS
By Ernest Holmes

What Do We Mean by Mental Equivalents?

"Prayer does something to the mind of the one praying.  It does not do anything to God.  The eternal Gift is always made.  The Gift of God is the Nature of God, the Eternal Givingness.  God cannot help making the gift, because GOD IS THE GIFT.  We do not have to pray God to be God.  God is God.  Jesus revealed the nature of the Divine Being by his personal embodiment of the Divine Nature.  He said, "As ye believe, it shall be done unto you."

The whole teaching of Jesus was based on the theory that we are surrounded by an intelligent Law, which does unto each as he believes.  He implied the necessity of faith, conviction, and acceptance.  That is, it must be measured out to us according to our own measuring.  We must not only believe, we must know that our belief measures the extent and degree of our blessing.  If our belief is limited only a little can come to us, because that is as we believe.  We call this the law of mental equivalents.  How much life can any man experience?  As much as he can embody.  There is nothing fatalistic about this.  We are so constituted that we can continuously increase our embodiment.  We grow in grace, as it were.  We grow in power and theoretically there should be no limit to that growth.  But right today we can expect to demonstrate or to have our prayers answered according to our belief and the embodiment of that belief.

Lowell said, "The gift without the giver is bare," and it is just as true that there can be no gift without a receiver.  It is said, "To as many as received him, to them gave he the power."  We seek to uncover the science of prayer:  the essence of the Spirit embodied in it.  We find that the essence of the power of prayer is faith and acceptance.  In addition to the law of faith and acceptance, the law of mental equivalents must be considered.  These are the two great laws with which we have to deal and we shall never get away from either.  If prayer has been answered, it is not because God has been moved to answer one man and not another, but because one man more than another has moved himself into a right relationship with the Spirit or the Principle of Being - whichever one chooses to call It.

Faith, then, touches a Principle which responds, we may be certain of this.  We should have more faith than we do rather than less, nor is it foolish to cultivate faith.  ALL PRAYERS WILL BE ANSWERED WHEN WE PRAY ARIGHT.  The first necessity is faith.  Faith!  But someone may exclaim, "This is what has always been taught, this is nothing new!"  Correct, we have nothing new.  We simply have a new approach to an old truth, a more intelligent, a more systematic way of consciously arriving at faith.  This is what treatment is for."

April 15 ~ The Science of Mind in a Year

The Technique of Acquiring Faith ~ Ernest Holmes

"One cannot be a good student of the Science of Mind who is filled with fear and confusion.  He must keep himself in a state of equilibrium, in a state of poise, peace and confidence...in a state of spiritual understanding. By spiritual understanding, is not meant anything strange or unnatural, but merely that the belief in goodness must be greater than any apparent manifestation of its opposite. It is this science of faith we are seeking to uncover - a definite technique that will conduct our minds through a process of thought, if necessary, to that place which the sublime minds of all ages have reached by direct intuition.

There is no one who believes more in faith, more in prayer, or more in the necessity of the Divine Will being done, than he who practices daily the Science of Mind.  He has relieved his mind of the morbid sense that the Will of God can be the will of suffering; for if there were a suffering God, and if we are eternal beings, then we should suffer through all eternity.  But a suffering God is an impossibility.  We suffer because we are not in both conscious and subjective communication with the affirmative side of the Universe.  All human misery is a result of ignorance; and nothing but knowledge can free us from this ignorance and its effect.

As students of the Science of Mind, we find in the remarkable character of Jesus, a great impetus toward faith and conviction. The Centurion came to Jesus and asked Him to heal his servant, and Jesus said:  "Go thy way; and as thou has believed, so be it done unto thee."  The Centurion had what we call a mental equivalent of Divine authority.  In the realm in which he lived, he was accustomed to speak his word with authority.  He accepted the word of Jesus as having authority on the invisible plane.  Jesus said, "I have not found so great faith, no, not in all Israel."

It is wonderful to contemplate the mental attitude of people who are not afraid to believe their prayers will be answered, and are not afraid to say, "I know."  We shall all arrive at this same assurance, this perfect faith, in such degree as we cease contemplating the Universe as opposed to Itself; as we cease having the will to do or to be that which is contrary to the Universal Good.

There is nothing in the universal order that denies the individual's good, or self-expression, so long as such self-expression does not contradict the general good, does not contradict Goodness Itself.  There is nothing in the Universe that denies us the right to be happy, if our happiness does not deny or interfere with the general good.  The Universe remains unlimited, though the whole world has suffered a sense of limitation.

We should be careful not to divide our mental house against itself. Having announced the law of liberty, we must not deny it.  When we shall all know the Truth, then ways and means and methods will be found for the freedom of all.  The mold of acceptance is the measure of our experience.  The Infinite fills all molds and forever flows into new and greater ones. Within us is the unborn possibility of limitless experience  Ours is the privilege of giving birth to it!"

April 7 ~ The Science of Mind in a Year

Prayer Is Its Own Answer ~ Ernest Holmes

"Cause and effect are but two sides of thought, and Spirit, being ALL, is both Cause and Effect.  Prayer, then, is its own answer.  The Bible tells us:  "Before they call will I answer."  Before our prayer is framed in words, God has already answered, but if our prayer is one of partial belief, then there is only a tendency toward its answer; if the next day we wholly doubt, then there is no answer at all.  In dealing with Mind, we are dealing with a Force we cannot fool.  We cannot cheat Principle out of the slightest shadow of our most subtle concept.  The hand writes and passes on, but the writing remains; and the only thing that can erase it is writing of a different character.  There is no obstruction one cannot dissipate by the power of Truth.

So we learn to go deeply within ourselves, and speak as though there were a Presence there at hat knows; and we should take the time to unearth this hidden cause, to penetrate this inner chamber of consciousness. It is most worthwhile to commune with Spirit - to sense and feel It. The approach to Spirit is direct...through our own consciousness.

This Spirit flows through us.  Whatever intelligence we have is this Spirit in us.  Prayer is its own answer.

We can be certain that there is an Intelligence in the Universe to which we may come,that will guide and inspire us, a love which overshadows.  God is real to the one who believes in the Supreme Spirit, real to the soul that senses its unity with the Whole.

Every day and every hour we are meeting the eternal realities of life, and in such degree as we co-operate with these eternal realities in love, peace, in wisdom, and in joy - believing and receiving- we are automatically blessed.  Our prayer is answered before it is uttered."

February 19 ~ The Science of Mind in a Year

Limitless Medium ~ Ernest Holmes

"When we realize that in dealing with our own individuality, we are dealing with Self-Conscious Mind, and when we realize that in dealing with subjective mind, we are dealing with a Universal Subjectivity, we shall come to understand that we have a Creative Intelligence at our disposal, compared with which the united intelligence of the human race is as nothing.  The Universal Subjective Mind, being entirely receptive to our thought, is compelled by Its very nature, to accept that thought and act upon it no matter what the thought may be.

Since we are dealing with an Infinite Power, which knows only Its own ability to do, and since It can objectify any idea impressed upon It, there can be no limit to what It can or would do for us, other than the limit of our inward embodiment.  Limitation is not in Principle nor in Law, but only in the individual use we make of Principle.  Our individual use of It can only equal our individual capacity to understand It, to embody It. We cannot demonstrate beyond our ability to provide a mental equivalent of our desire.

Subjectivity is entirely receptive and neutral as we have learned, and It can take our thoughts only the way we think them - It has no alternative.  If I say, "I am unhappy," and continue to say it, the subconscious mind says, "Yes, you are unhappy," and keeps me unhappy as long as I say it, for thoughts are things, and an active thought will provide an active condition for good or evil.

Suppose one has thought poverty year after year, he has thereby personified a law which continues to perpetuate this condition.  If the thought is not erased the condition will remain.  A law has been set in motion which says "I am poor," and sees to it that this is so.  This is at first an auto-suggestion, then it becomes an unconscious memory, working day and night.  This is what decides how the Law of Attraction works for us, because the laws of attraction and repulsion are entirely subjective.  Our use of them may be conscious to start with, but it becomes subconscious as soon as used. 

Suppose I do not say I am poor, but that I came into the world with an unconscious  thought of poverty.  So long as this thought remains, I am likely to remain poor.  I may not understand the Law, but it will be working all the time.  We come into this world with a subjective tendency toward conditions, but we must not forget that we are also dealing with a subjective tendency toward ultimate good, because in spite of all conditions, the race believes more in good than in evil; otherwise it would not continue to exist.  This is the eternal hope and sense of our life.

The encouraging message in all of this is, no matter what may be in the subjective state of our thought, the conscious state can change it; this is what treatment does.  How can this be done?  Through the most direct method imaginable:  by consciously knowing that there is no inherited tendency toward limitation, no race suggestion operating through subjectivity, nothing in, around or through us that believes in or accepts limitation in any way, shape, manner or form.  We do not stop here, this is only half the treatment.  The conscious state must now provide a higher contemplation, a spiritual realization, which says:  "I partake of the nature and bounty of the All Good and I am now surrounded by everything which makes life worth while."  The Universal Medium at once changes Its thought (because Its thought is deductive only) and says:  "Yes, I am all these things in you," and immediately begins the work of bringing such conditions to pass. Whatever is held in consciousness until it becomes a apart of the subjective  side of thought, tends to take place in the world of affairs.  The reason that we do not demonstrate more easily is that the subjective state of our thought is too often neutralized by the objective state, though often this is an unconscious process of thought. 

Whatever our subconscious mind holds long enough, is bound to be produced in our external affairs.  Our subconscious Mind is the Medium in which we all live and move an have our being on the subjective side of life - our atmosphere in Universal Subjectivity - the Medium through which all intercommunication takes place on every plane. 

It follows from what we have said, that any suggestion held in Creative Mind would produce its logical result, no matter what such suggestion might be.  If it were a suggestion of good, it would construct, for this is a neutral field.

Christ and Antichrist

The Spirit of Christ means that mentality which recognizes the Law and uses It for constructive purposes only.  The spirit of antichrist means the spirit of the individual who understanding the Law, uses It destructively.  The meaning of the Flood or Deluge (which is recorded in every sacred scripture we have ever heard of or read) is that a race of people once lived upon the earth who came to understand the psychic or subjective Law as being the servant of the Spirit. They understood themselves to be Spirit, but they did not understand the harmonious Unity of Spirit.  They had arrived at an intellectual concept of the Law - a very clearly defined mental concept - but that knowledge was not used for constructive purposes. They used the Law destructively, and what happened?  The confusion which took place in the psychic world (or the psychic atmosphere of this planet) caused its physical correspondence in the form of a Deluge or the Flood.

There have been many controversies about the use and misuse of the Power of Mind.  Some claim that we cannot misuse this Power, since there is but One Mind and It cannot act against Itself.  MIND CANNOT ACT AGAINST ITSELF; AND ANY PERSON WHO KNOWS THIS, and KNOWS THERE IS  NO HUMAN MIND TO DESTROY, IS IMMUNE FROM MALPRACTICE.

We need have no fear of the misuse of this Law, if we protect ourselves by the realization that there is but One Ultimate Reality, for "against such there is no law."  We recognize Subconscious Mind as the Great Servant of our thought, the Medium through which all treatment operates; and this Universal Subjective Mind we contact within ourselves and nowhere else!  Being omnipresent, It is in us; our use of It we call our subjective mind, but of Itself It is Universal."

January 24 ~ The Science of Mind in a Year

Place No Limit on Principle ~ Ernest Holmes, The Science of Mind

Know your own mind. Train yourself to think what you wish to think; be what you wish to be; feel what you wish to feel, and place no limit on Principle!

The words which you speak would be just as powerful as the words which Jesus spoke, if you knew your word was the Law whereunto it was sent, but you must KNOW this WITHIN and not merely accept it with your intellect.  If you have reached a point where the inner consciousness believes, then your word is simply an announcement of Reality!

KNOW - without a shadow of a doubt - that as a result of your treatment, some action takes place in Infinite Mind.  Infinite Mind is the actor and you are the announcer.  If you have a  vague, subtle, unconscious fear, be quiet and ask yourself, "Who am I?"  "What am I?"  "Who is speaking?"  "What is my life?"  IN this manner think right back to the Principle, until your thought becomes perfectly clear again.  Such is the power of right thinking, that it cancels and erases everything unlike itself.  It answers every question, solves all problems, is the solution to every difficulty.  It is like the sunlight of Eternal Truth, bursting through the clouds of obscurity and bathing all life in glory.  It is the Absolute with which you are dealing.  ALL THERE REALLY IS, IS GOD!

God Never Compromises

In demonstrating over conditions, the only inquiries we need to make are:  "Do the things we want lend themselves to a constructive program?  Do they express a more abundant life, rob no one, create no delusion, and express a greater degree of livingness?"  If we are able to answer these questions affirmatively, then all the power in the Universe is back of our program!  If it is money, houses, automobiles, lands, stocks, bonds, dresses, shirts or shoe strings - all of which come from the same source - there can be nothing either in the Law or in the Spirit back of the Law, to deny us the right to the greatest possible expression of life.

Good never compromises with Its opposite.  The one practicing must be able to look a fact in the face, and know that all manifestations are effects and can be changed by changing the mental cause. He must be able to look at the sick man who has come to him for help, and know that only perfection stands before him; he must see beyond the appearance to that which is basically perfect.  This will not be irrational to the one who has made a careful study of the Science of Mind and Spirit.

Truth knows no opposites.  When we take away the belief in evil - the belief that the outward appearance is the same as the inner reality - evil flees.  We must continually remind ourselves of the power of the Word, and of our ability to use it.  We must know that Truth produces freedom because Truth is freedom.  Our work will best be done in quiet expectancy and in calm confidence. The results rest in the Eternal Law of Good.

January 17 ~ Science of Mind in a Year

What It Does ~ Ernest Holmes, The Science of Mind

"We should approach the study of this Science rationally, never expecting to drive any benefits from it that its Principle does not contain.  For while it is true that we are immersed in an Infinite Intelligence, a Mind that knows all things, it is also true that this Intelligence can acquaint us with Its ideas only as we are able and willing to receive them.  The Divine Mind is Infinite.  It contains all knowledge and wisdom, but, before It can reveal Its secrets, It must have an outlet.  This outlet we shall be compelled to supply through our own receptive mentalities.

All invention, art, literature, government, law and wisdom that has come to the race has been given to it through those who have deeply penetrated the secrets of nature and the mind of God.

Perhaps the simplest way to state the proposition is to say that we are surrounded by a Mind, or Intelligence, that knows everything; that the potential knowledge of all things exists in this Mind; that the abstract essence of beauty, truth and wisdom co-exist in the Mind of the Universe; that we also exist in It and may draw from It.  BUT WHAT WE DRAW FROM IT WE MUST DRAW THROUGH THE CHANNEL OF OUR OWN  MINDS.  A unity must be established, and a conscious connection must be made, before we can derive the benefits which the greater Mind is willing to reveal or impart to us.

The Spirit can give us only what we can take; It imparts of Itself only as we partake of Its nature.  It can tell us only what we can understand.  The Infinite Knowingness becomes our wisdom only in such degree as we embody Its Intelligence.  It has been said that we can know God only in so far as we can become God.  This is a far-reaching thought and should be carefully scrutinized.  It is to be taken figuratively and not too literally, for we cannot really become God, but we can and do partake of the Divine Nature, and the Universal does personify Itself through man in varying degrees, according to man's receptivity to It.

The Universe Impersonal

The Universe is impersonal.  It gives alike to all.  It is no respecter of persons.  It values each alike.  Its nature is to impart, ours to receive.  When we stand in the light, we cast a shadow across the pathway of our own experience.  Emerson advises that we get our bloated nothingness out of the way of the divine circuits.

A Riddle of Simplicity

It is a beautiful and true thought to realize that every man stands in the shadow of a mighty Mind, a pure Intelligence, and a Divine givingness!  Not alone unto the great comes the soft tread of the Unseen Guest.  The arrogant have not perceived the simplicity of faith, but the pure in heart see God.  The farmer has seen the Heavenly Host in his fields.  The child has frolicked with Him at play.  The mother has clasped Him to her breast and the fond lover has seen Him in the eyes of his beloved.  We look too far away for Reality.

The intelligence by and through which we perceive that there is a Spiritual Presence and an Infinite Mind in the Universe, constitutes our receptivity to It, and decides Its flow through us.  We have made a riddle out of simplicity; therefore, we have not read the sermons written in stones, nor interpreted the light of love running through life.

To return to a sane simplicity is one of the first and most important things to do.  All men receive some light, and this light is always the same light.  There is one nature diffused throughout all nature; One God incarnated in all peoples.

The Divine Incarnation is inherent in our nature.  We are immersed in an Infinite Knowingness.  the question is, how much of this Realty are we going to express in our own lives?  The direct approach is always the best and the most effective.  In so far as any man has spoken the truth, he has proclaimed God -- it matters not what his particular approach may have been.  The scientist and the philosopher, the priest and the professor, the humanitarian and the empire builder, all have caught some gleam of the eternal glory and each has spoken, in his own tongue, that language which is of itself Universal.

Let us do away with a ponderosity of thought and approach the thing simply and quietly. It is the nature of the Universe to give us what we are able to take.  It cannot give us more.  It has given all, we have not yet accepted the greater gift.

Spiritual wisdom says that God manifests through everything and is incarnated in all men; that all is Divinity and that Nature herself is the body of God. The mechanical laws of nature are set and immutable, but the spontaneous recognition of these laws gives us the power to bring them into practical use in everyday life and experience.

Here we have a dual unity; law and order, spontaneous choice, volition, conscious action, and automatic reaction.  The laws of the universe are to be trusted but we must come to understand them before we can use them.  Once understood, any law is available and is impersonally responsive to each and all alike.

Love Rules Through Law

In an intelligent study of the teachings of the Science of Mind, we come to understand that all is Love and yet all is Law.  Love rules through Law.  Love is the Divine Givingness; Law is the Way.  Love is spontaneous; Law is impersonal.  We should study the nature of Reality with this in mind, and in this way we shall avoid two grave mistakes:  either viewing life as made up only of mechanical laws, or viewing it as made up only of spontaneous actions, irrespective of law and order.

As we gain the broader viewpoint, we shall see that Life must contain two fundamental characteristics.  We shall see that there is an Infinite Spirit, operating through an Infinite and Immutable Law.  In this, Cosmos, and not chaos, finds an eternal existence in Reality.  Love points the way and Law makes the way possible."

January 14 ~ The Science of Mind in a Year

Memory ~ Ernest Holmes, The Science of Mind

"Pondering on this, man came to the conclusion that memory was an active thing, and he reasoned after this fashion:  "Memory must be the storehouse of all ideas that have passed through my mind.  Memory is active, for my thoughts come back to me. My thought is conscious of my body; my body is operated upon by my thought, and it must be operated upon by my memory, since memory is active; but since memory is the result of conscious thought, memory of itself is an unconscious operation of what was once a conscious thought."  THIS IS ONE OF THE MOST IMPORTANT CONCLUSIONS WHICH THE MIND OF MAN HAS EVER MADE.  By changing his thought, he could re-mold his affairs; and by right thinking he could bring new conditions into his life!  Tremendous!

Science

Science is the knowledge of facts based upon some proven principle.  The scientific investigation of anything is, of necessity, a cold-blooded proposition.  We speak about knowing, about science being absolute knowledge; science is absolute knowledge, in so far as the facts of science are demonstrable!

How Laws are Discovered

In the scientific discovery of laws, certain theories are postulated; such theories may develop through research and investigation.  When a theory proves to be correct, after many experiments, then, a principle is announced.  In this way scientific truth is demonstrated; but no one has ever seen any of these principles which science announces, as no one has ever seen the great Cause which lies back of all the manifestations of life.

As soon as a law is discovered, experiments are made with it, certain facts are proven to be true, and in this way, a science is gradually formulated. Any science consists of the number of known facts about its invisible principle.  As more and more facts are gathered and proven, the science expands and gradually becomes accepted by all and may be used by those who understand it.

The Science of Mind

Let us, then approach the Science of Mind with awe, but not with fear; with a truly humble spirit, but not with any sense that we are unworthy, and certainly with no superstition.  Let us approach it normally, happily, willing to accept it, glad to experiment with it, believing that as a result of our efforts we shall derive this great good -- a better understanding of the natural laws of Life as they apply to the individual and his relationship to the universal scheme of things.

The Science of Mind, then, is the study of Life and the nature of the laws of thought; the conception that we live in a spiritual Universe; that God is in, through, and around and for us.  There is nothing supernatural anywhere, on any plane; that which today seems to us supernatural, after it is understood will be found spontaneously natural.

We say there is a Universal Mind; but no one ever saw It.  We say God is Spirit; but no one ever saw God.  The Bible says, "No man hath seen God at any time; only the Son, he hath revealed Him."  To express this idea in our language:  No one has seen Cause; because we see an effect, we know there must be a Cause.  Nothing is more evident than the fact that we live; and since we live, we must have life, and since we have life there must be Life.  The only proof we have of Mind is that we think.  The Eternal Principle is forever hidden.

January 12 ~ The Science of Mind in a Year

Spirit Works for Us by Working Through Us ~ Ernest Holmes, The Science of Mind

"The Thing, then works for us by working through us and is us, always. It cannot work for us in any other way  It spreads Itself over the whole universe and shouts at us from every angle, but It can become power to us ONLY WHEN WE RECOGNIZE IT AS POWER.

We cannot recognize that It is, while we are believing that It is not.  Hence, it is written:  "they...entered not in because of unbelief."  (Heb. 4:6)  We may enter in because of our belief, but we cannot enter while there is unbelief.  Here we come to a house divided against itself.  If we say we can only experience a little good, then we shall experience but a little good.  But, if we say, with Emerson, "There is no great and no small to the soul that maketh all," then we may experience a greater good because we have conceived it.

Therefore, our belief sets the limit to our demonstration of a Principle which, of Itself, is without limit.  It is ready to fill everything, because It is Infinite.  So, it is not a question of Its willingness, nor of Its ability.  It is entirely a question of our own receptivity. 

How Much Can We Believe?

That we must go the way of the Law, is a fundamental tenet of this Science, because Nature obeys us as we first obey It, and our obedience to It is our acceptance of It.  How much can we believe?  AS MUCH AS WE CAN BELIEVE will be done unto us.

When the consciousness speaks, the law receives and executes. When a farmer plants a seed, he invokes the law.  That which follows is done by the mechanical side of Nature, which has no volition of Its own.  Involution is the cause and evolution is the effect.  When a practitioner thinks, or gives a treatment, or makes a prayer, he is dealing with involution - the first step of the creative order.  This is what the Bible calls the Word.  That which follow is evolution, or the unfoldment of the word, or concept, into objective existence.

We are thinking, willing, knowing, conscious centers of Life.  We are surrounded by, immersed in, and there is flowing through us, a creative Something....call It what you will.  The sum total of all our thought, will, purpose, and belief, creates a tendency in the Law that causes It to react to us according to the sum total of that belief.

Ignorance of the law excuses no one from its effects.  If then, certain specific ways of thought and belief have produced limitations, other beliefs will change them.  We must learn to believe.  The approach should be direct, and it should be specific.

Suppose one is laboring under the idea of limitation.  His whole thought is a picture of limitation.  Where is he placing himself in Mind?  Is he not, in substance, saying:  "I cannot have and enjoy good things"?  And he is demonstrating that he cannot have, or accomplish, good.  It may take time to reshape the basis of his thought; he must commence by saying, "I perceive that because I am what I am - because of this Infinite Thing that over-shadows eternity and finds Its abiding place in me, I know that good is now mine - all good."  There is no mental coercion in this.  We do not will things to be done; things are brought into being, not by will, but by the power of the self-assertive Truth.

How much can one demonstrate?  Just what one can believe.  How much can we see, how much can we accept, how much can we find in our consciousness that is no longer repudiated by our own denials?  Whatever that is, THAT MUCH WE CAN HAVE.

Good Only - Not Good and Evil

The gardener goes forth in faith to sow his seeds.   He has learned that as he sows, so shall he reap; that the law works for all alike.  We must accustom ourselves to the concept of the impersonalness of the law, the availability of the law, and the mechanical accuracy of the law.  If we can conceive only a little good, that is as much as we can experience.

We must instill into the mind the fundamental proposition that good is without bounds.  Only good and loving-kindness shall "follow me all the days of my life."  (Psalms 23)  We must get this concept, rather than continuing to think there is a power of evil as opposed to the power of Good.  We experience good and evil because we perceive a presence of duality rather than unity.

Then, knowing that The Thing can work for us only through us, let us begin to accept today more good than we experienced yesterday, and to know that we shall reap a harvest of fulfilled desires.  The time must come when we shall have left the apparent evil behind; when it shall be rolled up like a scroll and numbered with the things which were once thought to be.

Let us realize and work with this sound knowledge and perfect faith:  That as high as we shall make our mark in Mind and Spirit, so high shall be Its outward manifestation in our material world."